


i'm sorry if i smothered you

by mondegreen (teesandjays)



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-14
Updated: 2013-08-14
Packaged: 2017-12-23 10:56:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/925552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teesandjays/pseuds/mondegreen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Paul still dreams about her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm sorry if i smothered you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



Sometimes he dreams about her. It’s always dark and it’s always painful - tastes like guilt and regret and anger but it looks a lot like sadness. He thinks he should feel more detached from the situation, shouldn’t carry around her memory like a parasite he can’t get off but he can’t. Because you see, you don’t stay with someone for two years, you don’t share a home with them, a bed, a _life_ \- and stay unattached.

She is without a doubt, ingrained in him. She hides in corners of his mind, drapes herself in the shadows and remains quiet and nonthreatening but she is always, _always_ there. It shows in little parts of his life, the ones that seem insignificant and unimportant but are undoubtedly a part, no matter how small, of who you are.

Like the way he never leaves his socks or his underwear on the bathroom floor because he's used to hearing her complain about picking up after him in that curt and pointed way of hers, eyebrows raised and lips stretched out in a thin line.

He still can’t smell lavender without thinking of her, and apples always make nostalgia curl around his chest soft and slow, leaving him with phantom impressions of a punch to the gut - she used to eat them every morning.

He grieves for her in his own way when he’s ready. He doesn't cry because he doesn't deserve to.

And sometimes he dreams about her. She looks at him with those warm brown eyes - he’s seen those eyes so many times in the last few months but hers are always different, they’re all different. But she looks at him and her lips are pale but her eyes are shining and she asks him ‘why didn’t you love me’ and he says ‘I do love you’.

And every time she smiles at him in that sad, disappointed way people tend to do when you've missed something important they were trying to tell you.

“Not enough Paul,” she says and then again in a whisper ‘not enough’ and turns around to leave. He thinks he should call out for her, run to her, grab her and tell her that he’s sorry - he thinks he should to something to make her wait, just for a second. But he never does.

He wakes up and wishes he could have loved her the way she wanted him to.

**Author's Note:**

> just a little thing while i try to get back into my groove. also because the show never expanded on paul in relation to beth's death and i just wanted to see him feeling guilty as fuck for a little while. 
> 
> title's unashamedly stolen from daughter's smother which i had on repeat while writing.


End file.
